


Amen

by rosegaarden



Category: Original Work
Genre: Assisted Suicide, Character Death, Cults, HES A MURDEROUS HEAD OF A CULT IDK WHAT TO TELL YOU, Murder, Religious Abuse, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, or i guess like, something like that
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-23
Updated: 2018-06-23
Packaged: 2021-03-05 02:02:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 788
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25356667
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosegaarden/pseuds/rosegaarden
Summary: “To take a life… to commit such a sin… and then deny pleasure in the act. Sister, I had such high hopes for you.”
Kudos: 3





	Amen

**Author's Note:**

> One of my more underutilised characters, Judas, a cultist masquerading as a priest. He murders people who disappoint him. He's disappointed.

Her hands had been shaking when she killed him. They still shook now, Judas noted, though he was far more fascinated with the way that her trembling coaxed droplets of blood from her hands to stain the hallowed halls of the cathedral in deep crimson. He’d learned long ago blood wasn’t the bright red of fantasies. There was no beauty in that brightness. But how those earthen tones stained at pale skin, and flowed through the cracks that made her up, that was beautiful, an unholy form of kintsugi repairing the cracks of the psyche with a sinful adhesive.

But not this one. Judas could tell that this one, she couldn’t be fixed. The simple act of murder was enough to shatter her beyond repair. Terrified eyes look out from under the safe shroud of her habit, down at the body in front of her. This, he could never understand, how they could stare at something they did as if it wasn’t their own hand to commit their sin.

“Sister,” His voice has a quality of music to it, from years preaching, and speaking low and soft behind lattice partitions of confessionals forgiving sins in sweet susurrations. The woman looks to him, sudden.

“I… I killed him…”

“You did.”

“I didn’t–”

Judas’ eyes narrow, predator, as he stalks to her. The knife in her hand catches candlelight with each involuntary shiver, only increasing as their distance closes. “Didn’t what, Sister? Mean to? But you did.”

“No…”

Her voice breaks on that word. Fingers begin to loosen, only for Judas to move in swiftly behind her and hold her fist, closing her hand back around the handle slowly. “Shh… it’s alright.” There against his back, she sobs, and his free arm wraps around her waist in a twisted parody of an embrace. “To take a life… to commit such a sin… and then deny pleasure in the act. Sister, I had such high hopes for you.”

Some took to sin swiftly, as if their souls were meant to carry its weight and burden. These were the ones that Judas found favor in. The degenerate and sacrilege who had no qualms in desecration of holy spaces, in the breaking of commandments. In defying the words of God. To take a pure heart and turn it to sin, to place himself in their minds above the one holy pinnacle that should never be toppled… He was a man of many vices but that was the sweetest to indulge. This, however… was unfortunate.

She trembles under his touch, sliding in delicate movements up along her scapular to find her chin. Gentle… but undeniably firm as Judas lifts her head toward the corpse. “Look at him.” Another sob, her chin tries to wrench itself free, but his fingers dig down against her jaw in a bruising grip that leaves nowhere to go.

**“Look at him!”**

Those words echo through the empty church halls, loud, a chorus of winged demons in flight that swarmed above-head in a mockery of God to accuse her, and she breaks. Tears flowing free and loud to fall over Judas’ skin. Only then does he let go and pry back her habit to pet her head. “You’ve done something terrible, Sister. Something awful.”

“What-” She can barely speak through her whimpers, sniffling as her head again falls. “What do I do, father?”

Loose ends needed to be tied. She could have been accepted into the fold… But now she was nothing but a liability. His flock needed wolves, not lambs. “Will you lead us through a Hail Mary, Sister?”

Her arm is pliant, willing, as he bends it, guides it like puppet master pulling at strings. Where his voice is calm and controlled, hers wavers in fear under him. “Hail Mary, full of grace… The Lord is with thee… Blessed are thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb Jesus,”

A sob leaves her throat when the knife’s edge, still held tight in her palm, is coaxed up against her throat, trailing into whimpers when Judas shushes her. “Keep going. It’s alright. God is with you.”

“Holy Mary Mother of God…” Her eyes shut tightly. The blade presses against bare flesh and tastes her blood. “Pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death–”

The last word barely leaves her mouth as Judas’s grip tightens, and a sharpened athame point glides across her skin, cutting through as though she were simple paper. Choked sounds leave her through the blood that spills, liberal like wine, and stains her, the floor beneath her. Judas lets her go, watching as she falls unceremoniously to the floor. Her eyes are wide, and blank, staring to nothing.

“Amen.”


End file.
